My pulse pounds harder as he moves around my body, tightening each restraint. “Point out every crack, every flaw?” he continues, eyes darkening as he steps back to take in the sight of me strung up against the wall. “Now it’s time to do that to you.”
I start trembling as his gaze lingers on me, fear creeping up my spine.
Is this it?
Is this when he finally decides to punish me, to fuck me while I’m helpless and tied and can’t do anything about it?
Horrifyingly, some part of me almost wants him to, almost wishes he’d just get it over with so he can stop wielding it against me as a fear tactic and finally cut the ever-present tension between us.
But it doesn’t happen. Instead, I hear the click of approaching footsteps, a whole new kind of panic setting in.
“Ah, right on time,” Raf drawls as Chelsea and Blair appear in the doorway, looking way too damn pleased to be joining us. He glances toward Chelsea, brow furrowing. “Where’s Stella?”
“Saint Stella decided to sit this one out,” she replies, rolling her eyes as she moves toward him. A smug smile stretches her lips as her gaze flickers past Raf toward me, eyes burning with amusement. “Don’t worry,” she purrs, tapping a palm against his hard chest. “We’ve got this.”
“Do it right, and you can come out of exile,” Raf mumbles, shoving a hand into his pocket and pulling out a fistful of markers. He offers them to Chelsea, but when she goes to take them, he holds on, leaning in with a savage glare. “Remember,” he growls, “only the marker touches her skin.”
I see a flicker of anger cross Chelsea’s features, but she quickly schools her expression, nodding back at him.
Raf turns to glance over at me one last time, then relinquishes his grip on the markers, taking a step back. “She’s all yours then, girls.”
His words hit me like a spray of bullets, the depth of his depravity fully sinking in as he stalks out of the room, leaving me with the pair of blondes. Chelsea clutches the markers to her chest with a triumphant smirk, her gaze sweeping over my bare body like a predator picking a spot to sink its teeth in.
“Oh, honey,” she sighs, clucking her tongue and shaking her head. “Where do we even start?”
Blair giggles, reaching out to snatch a marker out of her friend’s hand. “I say we start with those hips,” she remarks, popping off the cap and moving toward me.
I could scream, I could struggle, but what’s the fuckingpoint? I’m tied up tight, and Raf just abandoned me here in the center of a maze with his psycho ex-girlfriend. Nothing or nobody can save me. I have no choice but to endure whatever comes.
Blair reaches out to draw a dotted line up my bare skin, marking me up with purple ink like a plastic surgery candidate. “These hips are wide enough to steer a fucking boat through,” she comments cruelly as she traces a more slender shape.
“What about that spare tire?” Chelsea snorts, reaching in with another marker to make a line on my belly. “Disgusting.”
Their criticism slices away my confidence like razor blades as they circle and scribble, my body turning into a mess of lines and arrows. They stand too close, cackling to one another as they point out flaw after flaw.
“Your nose is too long,” Chelsea scoffs, the tip of her marker scratching across my face. “And your chin’s so pointy.”
Each word is a slap, each mark a bruise.
“Lines are getting boring,” Blair sighs, tossing her marker aside and grabbing another. “Let’s do some labels.”
Chelsea’s eyes light up like she loves that idea.
“Filthy slut,” Blair murmurs, teeth biting into her lower lip with concentration as she writes it across my chest with the marker.
Chelsea shoulders Blair out of the way, dropping into a crouch. “W-H-O-R-E,” she spells out as she writes the letters across my underwear, the purple ink bleeding into the cotton.
That word sears like a brand. I try to go somewhere else in my mind, somewhere far away from here, but it’s no use…
A few choice words later, they let their markers drop to the floor,smug looks on their faces as they stand back to admire their work.
“Much better,” Chelsea clucks, nodding in satisfaction. Her blue eyes narrow on me coldly. “This is what you really are, Ava. Trash. Just a dirty whore to use and abuse. You’renobody. You’renothing.”
Hot tears prick behind my eyes, and I squeeze them shut to keep them from falling. I won’t give them that satisfaction of seeing me cry.
“The Kings will see that soon enough,” Chelsea continues, huffing a breath. “You’re just a hole for them to fuck. You’ll never be what they really need. What Raf needs.”
I don’t open my eyes again until I hear the fade of their receding footsteps. I’m all alone now, hanging here naked and trembling with every imperfection circled in ink, scribbles of hate etched into my skin.
